Surname Project

Groups of individual DNA results in the SFA surname project

Below is a description of the relationships in and between the groups of Stiles/Styles in the Stiles Surname DNA project. We examine the Y-DNA37 results. There are currently 76 such. There are 17 groups, 13 of which have more than one member and four that have a genealogical trail back to England and no competing genetic lines. There are an additional 9 Stiles/Styles that are labeled, “ungrouped,” with no matches and no likely trail back to England.. In addition there are a few male non Stiles/Styles with a Styles paper trail that is included The ungrouped people are unrelated to any of the groups here or to each other.. Two Groups are likely related and no others.

A mutation refers to differences in the number of repeats at a site in the DNA test so that two mutations would mean in one of the 37 sites considered here that there had been mutations at two different sites. The term mode refers to the most common value at a particular site for the Group. When speaking of mutation differences within a Group it is comparing results for the individual to the mode of the site for that Group unless otherwise noted.

In addition when referring to a particular person, they will be noted e.g. John, Sr. 1595 England means John Stiles, Sr. who was born in 1595 in England. The information about people comes from the SFA master file. HRS refers to Henry Reed Stiles and MSPG to Mary Stiles Paul Gould genealogies. Other information is added and should be self-explanatory. In some cases we have included potential pages in HRS but have not yet done so for MSPG.

A paper trail refers to the information in the SFA file. Most of the issues for DNA related people are the ends of their paper trails. The genetic relationships and those of paper trails may have conflicts. These involve lots of issues and these are most often about paper trails that end on John, Sr. 1595. There are lots of problems and issues related to people having lived in NJ. Too many “Stileses” one might say and two few records, is a comment often heard. Controversy over the paper trails of different sets of genetically unrelated people pointing to a common ancestor seems to be rife with many shared common ancestors.

There are two distinct close knit Groups with paper trails back to Robert 1637. The largest is Group A with 13 members at the Y-DNA37 level and the other, Group B, has six members. The genetic distance between Clusters A and B indicate that they are not related. The larger cluster is the direct descendants from Robert 1637 as they are descended from five of his sons. Group B are all descended from one son which is also in the A group but as noted the genetic distance of the modes indicates that the B group could not be descended for that son

Group A has seven people with no genetic variation, two just 1 mutation away, three 2 away and one 3 away from the mode of the cluster. The two who share Amos 1705 (one with 1 mutation and one with 3) as an ancestor have mutations at a common site that likely occurred some few generations after Robert 1637. The largest separation within the cluster between two individuals is 5 mutations. One member does not have a paper trail. Also there is a non-Stiles just 3 off the mode that we believe is likely to be related to this group..

Group B has six members.The largest variation in the cluster is 2 mutations. This cluster also has a paper trail that ends with Robert 1637. Group B members have three common ancestors before Robert 1637. . All members of B have a single paper trail to Samuel Sr. 1682 son of Robert 1637. Three of the people in unrelated Group A also have him as an ancestor. There is no indication as to where the adoption or other event contributed to the genetic mismatch for Group B. It is probable it between Samuel, 1682 and Israel, Sr. 1746 or between the latter and John, Sr. 1735/6

Group C is clearly a Joseph abt. 1648 England group. He settled in VA. It also is a close group with deviations from the mode of only one mutation except for one at four. There is one genetic cousin with an incomplete trail that will likely connect. However there is an additional case whose paper trail traces back to John 1595 England and is most certainly incorrect. This John line is unrelated to all others that appear to have John 1595 England and is a genetic cousin to another group.

Group D has 12 people in it. Itis the Thomas Stylles bef. 1567 England group and is the proper paper trail of the genetic cousins to to Thomas Stylles Jr. bef 1567 b England. There are trails to two of Thomas’s sons and therefore we essentially know his DNA values. In addition there is a Styles descendant in England that deviates just 1 from the mode but has no connecting paper trail that connects with the others. It is highly likely that Group G is related to Group D in recent times. The two group modes differ only by 3. There are other of our groups that are genetically unrelated genetically to Group D, in times names were used, that have paper trails back to Thomas and hence have some incorrect relationships in them.

Group E consists of a father, his uncle and also his son and one other person whose genealogy doesn’t connect yet. They differ by one mutation out of 37. These genetic cousins seem to connect in York, PA with another genetic relative but we don’t yet know how.

Group F is the most interesting genetic group of cousins for lots of reasons. Seven members have two major subgroupings. There is a non-Stiles who is a genetic cousin for which we have an incomplete paper trail but evidence exists that his ancestor was a Stiles adopted by another family and took their surname as his.

F1 has two members whose trails go back to Robert abt. 1666 whose father was Bartholomew 1635 and both were born in England. They differ by 2 mutations from each other and 1 and 2 mutations from the mode of the whole cluster. Robert’s son Robert was born in Chester, Burlington Co., N.J.in1692 and hence this is most likely a New Jersey Family. However the connection through John II 1695 is tenuous at best.

F2 has five members whose trails go back to John, Sr. 1595. This sub-cluster is broken down into two further divisions, F2a and F2b. They are unrelated to all others that appear to have John, Sr. 1595 as a common ancestor.

F2a has two members that have five common ancestors descended from John, Sr. 1595. They descend together from a Jacob 1777 b NJ who is in HRS. However, Robert abt. 1666 had a descendent named Jacob that died in 1817 in the same area and may indicate a different paper trail.

F2b has a similar issue around John, Jr. 1729 who supposedly died at age 4. There are lots of important notes in the SFA file that need to be addressed.

Group G is probably related to Group D sometime in the last 3 to 6 hundred years ago. The two modes are separated by only three mutations. G contains a sub-cluster of three people in which two are uncle and nephew. These individuals’ paper trail goes back to a brick wall at John, Sr. 1757 b VA? and appears to be the ancestor of most Stiles in NC. There are no mutations between them. These common mutations are three from the mode of Cluster D The three are an extremely tight match all the way to 111 site test. In addition there is an individual that has only tested to 25 but at that level is an exact match. The fourth person goes back to James 1790 b NC. and his trail does not connect to the other trail. His differs by one mutation from the other two. A fifth match does not have a tree in yet.

Cluster H is the line through Bermuda. One of the two members has a paper trail that goes through Bermuda to John 1600/10 in England. The other ends with Benjamin Sr. ab. 1720 in Bermuda. They differ by 4 mutations.

Cluster I has three members. There are two who have just 1 mutation between them and the third deviates by 5 and is at best probably weakly related to the other two. The two have a common ancestor of Benjamin 1805 PA. The earliest ancestor for the third is John G 1837 NJ.

Cluster J This is the only case of two genetic cousins in which only one is currently named Stiles. They are tightly related even out to Y-DNA111. There have been a detailed study of the cluster as a part of 8-10 related people and where the splits to different names took place. We will see if we can feature that later.

Cluster K has just two people with only one deviation between them. Their paper trails share three generations of ancestors before John, Sr. 1595 England and whose father, Generation 1, Thomas Stylles Jr. bef 1567 b England, whose DNA is known. They do not match so that there is a non-paternal event somewhere is the trail. The non-paternal event is probably between Gen. 3 and 4 or 4 and 5 as William Sr. 1733 is known for Group K.

Cluster L has just three people with only one deviation between them. Their paper trails share three generations of ancestors before John 1595 England and his father, Generation 1, Thomas Stylles Jr. bef 1567 b England and their DNA is known and they do not match Analysis indicates that they likely between Generations 3 and 4 or 4 and 5 as Ephraim, Jr. is certainly correct with two genetic lines emanating from him.

Cluster M has two members that have an exact match and incomplete and non-overlapping paper trails.

The next four “Groups” have only one member as mentioned above, they are N, O, P, ad Q

If you have questions go to the contact list and send them on as we look forward to being helpful.